


dark crimson rose

by luni



Series: it's no one's business but mine that all this love has been in vain [1]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Depression, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Unrequited Love, references to death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-12
Updated: 2017-03-12
Packaged: 2018-10-03 10:07:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10242230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luni/pseuds/luni
Summary: Yuuri never knows better.So, he does the only thing he's able to do."I'd love to make you happy."





	

**Author's Note:**

> **EDIT 19/04/17:** hey there! if you enjoyed this fic and would like to read more about this particular universe i'm currently writing a kind of companion piece, a multichaptered fic that branches off during cup of china and will have a different ending. you can find it in the series this oneshot belongs to! i suggest you read it because it offers a better look at this universe and how i portrayed yuuri's character in particular. so yeah consider giving it a read! thank you for your time ♥

Yuuri first experiences heartache when he turns sixteen years old and there's no soulmark to be found on his body.

  
Unmarked people are a rare occurrence, he knows, but the thought of being one never crossed his mind; now, as he finds no such thing as a soulmark on the whole expanse of his body, Yuuri can feel the ridges of a very deep crack running all the way down his spine, breaking him in half.

  
Surprisingly, it hurts.

  
Yuuri never wished for love, with skating being the only thing on his mind at all times, but he does a double take on his strongest beliefs and finds it so very odd how much he longs for something that should never belong to him: the privilege to share his soul with someone else, to love, and be loved, unconditionally.

  
The knowledge that, no matter how hard he tries, romantic love will never feel whole and real to him: that's what breaks him the night of his first Junior Grand Prix Final. Yuuri ends in sixth place and swallows bitter, bitter tears.

  
He thinks it's better to end it before it becomes too much, before the whole world sees him failing a second time, before his pride shatters: but Yuuri never knows better and Detroit awaits, so he goes.

 

 

  
It's 2014 and Yuuri ends in sixth place again, at the Grand Prix Final held in Sochi.

  
This time, there's no Detroit for him to escape to: he comes back to Hasetsu after years and years of absence, hiding from the world, and it's so easy. Maybe he doesn't even _deserve_ this degree of peace and tranquility, he thinks, as small seeds of doubt begin to sprout everywhere in his head.

  
_You probably don't deserve half the things that make you happy,_ they say. He never answers, and never questions their claims, too.

  
But Yuuri never knows better, and Victor Nikiforov is world champion at many things: especially surprises.

  
The first thing Yuuri notices isn't Victor's wonderful, wet, long-limbed body, completely naked in the heat of the onsen; it's the mark of a small, dark crimson rose, resting on his chest right above his heart.

  
"I'll make you win the Grand Prix Final," he declares, shooting a flirtatious wink.

 

 

  
That's how it starts.

 

 

  
A world where love is a synonym for freedom.

  
Yuuri wonders, is there such a world somewhere, out there? A world where people aren't bound by their own marks, where fate isn't laid out nice and clean at one's sixteenth birthday, as skin prickles and paints itself in lines and shapes and colours?

  
He would have probably loved living in that kind of world.

  
Victor stops asking Yuuri if he's alright around the tenth time he finds him still holed up in his room, at two in the afternoon. He sits on his bed, places a hand on the Yuuri-shaped lump apparently sleeping under the covers, and talks, talks, talks. His voice eventually grows hoarse but he never fetches a glass of water, never goes to the bathroom.

  
Never stops staying by Yuuri's side.

  
Yuuri is grateful.

  
He guesses that's the kind of love he deserves: distant, respectful, devoid of all passion.

 

 

  
(Yuuri never knows better.)

  
(It's plain to see. Victor's blue eyes are always following him, during training and when they're sitting side by side at dinner; he laughs so loudly when they talk, splashes water in Yuuri's face on their long days at the beach during Hasetsu's hot summer, his robe falls open when he bids him goodnight, head tilted to the side, hair so white in the moonlight; he runs a hand through Yuuri's hair when he's sleeping on the plane for Beijing, squeezing his hand when it's time to wake up.)

  
(Victor falls in love with an unmarked man, and that's how it ends.)

 

 

  
As soon as they're back in their hotel room, Victor shrugs his shirt down his shoulders and off his arms, babbling something incoherent about alcohol and duck blood. Yuuri started to loathe the sight of Victor's naked body way before his little drunken show of that dinner, (started to loathe the sight of Victor's soulmark as soon as he saw it), so he patiently picks up the discarded shirt and hands it back to Victor.

  
Victor pouts, hands already on his belt.

  
"I'm so hot, Yuuri."

  
"You could take a shower."

  
"Yeah... but I don't wanna," he murmurs, rubbing both hands on his face. Yuuri tosses Victor's shirt on the bed and-

  
"Why won't you look at me?"

  
-gasps, as Victor's arms close around his waist, and his breath tickles the shell of his ear. Yuuri can _feel_ Victor's gaze on his mouth, as he wets his own lips in anticipation.

  
Yuuri is grateful that he's not facing him: he lives on small mercies.

  
"I always look at you," says Victor, lips caressing the skin under Yuuri's ear, holding his shivering body close. "And you throw me aside. You hurt me."

  
Victor's fingers dive into the thick hair on the back of Yuuri's head, tug softly at it until he turns his head to the side, finally facing him.

  
(Yuuri might just forget how to breathe.)

  
"I'm so awful, Yuuri," Victor's voice _cracks_ , and his smile is so fake that Yuuri's heart beats faster, and faster, and Victor breathes on Yuuri's parted lips and it's like he's breathing his own sorrow into him- "I'm horrible."

 

 

  
They could have kissed.

  
Victor loves Yuuri.

  
Honestly, Yuuri wishes he could say the same thing.

 

 

  
The first selfish requests he has for Victor comes between sobs and tears in a quiet parking lot.

  
"Just have more faith than I do that I'll win! You don't have to say anything, just stay close to me and never leave!"

  
It's probably the last.

 

 

  
They kiss.

  
Victor loves Yuuri.

  
Yuuri would _die_ to feel the same thing.

 

 

  
There's a silver medal hanging from Yuuri's neck, there's silver hair falling on his shoulder where Victor's head is currently resting; their fingers are intertwined, thumbs caressing, thighs pressed together.

  
"You can be selfish," he tells Yuuri on the ride back to the hotel, in the back seat of a small, small cab. "You can be the most selfish person on Earth, if you want to."

  
Yuuri stays silent.

  
"Everyone deserves their own happiness. You deserve yours, too."

  
Still silent.

  
"I'd love to make you happy."

  
There's a whimper.

 

 

  
Victor's body is beautiful in the dim lights of the hotel room.

  
He's fully clothed, so Yuuri's focus rests on the shape of his shoulders as he lays on his side; Victor has a big forehead, heart-shaped lips, veiny arms, a curious gathering of birthmarks on his neck. His jawline is sharp as he calls Yuuri's name in the silence of the night.

  
Yuuri opens his eyes. (If only he knew that the prettiest shade of brown belongs to him and him alone.)

  
"I'm unmarked."

  
It comes out together with the soft rustling of sheets, as Victor shifts on the bed to look at him properly. He cracks a smile, and it's so sad. So very sad.

  
"I know."

  
"You-"

  
"I've known for a while."

  
(Flashes of a precedent banquet and the flushed cheeks of the most adorable boy he's ever danced with run through his mind.)

  
"...I'm sorry."

  
"I love you."

  
Yuuri really, really doesn't know how to describe himself right now.

  
So, he does the only thing he's able to do.

  
"No, Victor- I'm _wrong_ -"

  
"We can be wrong together," says Victor as he breaks, smiling, tears trickling down the side of his face, over his nose, down into the soft pillow. "I have no one but you, after all."

  
_You can be the most selfish person on Earth, if you want to._

  
Now, Yuuri understand.

  
But he still doesn't know what he is supposed to feel now.

  
"I had a soulmate."

  
Silent sobs are wracking Victor's body from the inside. Yuuri can't almost bear to look.

  
"He's been gone from this world for a long time. I don't even remember his face."

  
"That's..."

  
Victor nods furiously, sniffling loudly. "Yeah! That's horrible, isn't it? Awful. Tragic. So sad. Condolences, and all that. But I'm _tired_ ," he says, scooting up closer, trembling fingers caressing Yuuri's jaw with the reverence he could never really deserve. "I want whatever it was that they tore away from me all those years ago."

  
Yuuri never knows better.

  
"Will you love me, Yuuri?"

  
After all, they do have something in common: Yuuri and Victor are equally starved for love.

  
The only difference is that Victor will beg, and beg, and beg for the smallest scraps available- and Yuuri, tired, tired Yuuri, can't wait to die of hunger.

  
So, he keeps breaking his own heart.

  
"...I can't."

  
He breaks Victor's heart in the process, too.

 

 

 

 

 

It's the night before the Grand Prix Final.

  
(There's a small scratch on the ring finger of Victor's right hand. He'll just cover it up with gloves.)

  
They're in bed, and Yuuri turns out the lights.

  
"Goodnight-"

  
"Dark crimson roses have their own unique meaning."

  
Yuuri's silence allows him to speak.

 

(For a moment, he dares to dream of a different circumstance, maybe even a different world, where there are no soulmarks or concept of fate and destined bonds.)

  
Victor's smile cracks under the moonlight- it's still so beautiful, and Yuuri still doesn't deserve it. He dares to dream, for a moment, of a world where he could love beautiful, _beautiful_ Victor.  
But no such world exists.

 

 

 

 

 

"Mourning."

**Author's Note:**

> you know if this is what comes out when i stop writing pwps i think i'm better off writing pwps for the rest of my life. this shit hurts  
> i hope you Sadistically Enjoyed this mess because i did but i am also a creature of tears and regret rn


End file.
